This study examined the simultaneous effects of L2 individual difference (ID) variables (aptitude, motivation, strategy use, language processing experience, and gender) on English as a foreign language (EFL) breadth and depth of L2 vocabulary knowledge of 492 Korean university-level learners. Independent variable measures included the: (1) Korean…

This article reports on the results of action research conducted in a university ESP classroom in Oman. The impetus for this research was the practitioner's dissatisfaction with the current practice of introducing the grammatical concept of the English passive and its subsequent results. Framed within the sociocultural theory of cognitive…

The research work attempts to investigate that in any geographical contact zone, where the diverse languages and cultures intersect, there would inevitably be linguistic and cultural integration and assimilation. In a similar vein, the worldwide dissemination of the English language has radically shaped the linguistic and textual devices installed…

When bilinguals read in either their first language (L1) or their second language (L2), words from both languages are unconsciously and automatically activated in their mind (e.g., Kroll et al. 2006; Van Heuven and Dijkstra 2002). Many bilinguals, particularly in Florida, choose to learn Portuguese in college as a third language (L3), thus…

Usage-based linguistics posits that communicative functions, including pragmatics, are at the core of language (Tomasello, 1992). It is surprising, then, that pragmatics is rarely systematically included in second language curricula (e.g., Bardovi-Harlig, 2017), especially since pragmatics instruction has been shown to significantly contribute to…

This study investigated the effect of formulaic language on L2 learners' ability to decode words in listening texts. One possibility was that formulas would facilitate listening by reducing the need to process every word of the sequences. However, a contrasting possibility was that the commonly reduced nature of formulaic words would hinder…

This paper presents a rule-based task-oriented dialogue system for second language learning and a knowledge extraction method which automatically extracts the training data for Natural Language Understanding (NLU) and dialogue rules for dialogue management from a Dialogue Map (DM). The DM consists of turn-by-turn utterances between the system and…

This study explores the effect of translation strategies on undergraduate students' second language writing in three French composition classes. After the grammar translation method was used in foreign language teaching, translation in the foreign language classroom was banned for a long time. It is now reappearing in those language classrooms and…

Michael Swan and Catherine Walter (see EJ1142765) take issue with the current emphasis in the teaching of listening and reading on higher-order skills-and-strategies training. They argue that L2 learners typically already possess the relevant skills and strategies necessary for listening and reading in L2, and, by implication, can and do deploy…

This study investigates the role of prosodic cues and explicit information (EI) in the acquisition of German accusative case markers. We compared 4 groups of 3rd-semester learners (low intermediate level) who completed 1 of 4 Processing Instruction (PI) treatments that manipulated the presence or absence of EI and focused prosody. The results…

We explored the vocabulary and metaphor comprehension of learners of English as an additional language (EAL) in the first two years of UK primary school. EAL vocabulary knowledge is believed to be a crucial predictor of (reading) comprehension and educational attainment (Murphy, 2018). The vocabulary of five- to seven-year-old children with EAL…

The present study compared the performance of two groups of second language learners processing three linguistic structures in Spanish. The linguistic targets were passives, object pronouns in O[subscript pro]VS sentences, and gender-cued null subjects in subordinate clauses. The primary differences between the two groups were language experience…

Vocabulary as an undeniable part of language learning is a main component in communication which requires to be taught in innovative ways. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of musical mnemonic on vocabulary recalling, and long-term retention of words by young learners. The design of study was experimental. Sixty teenagers from…

The aim of the present study is to examine experimentally the influence of using lexical chunks on the achievement of second-year-university students of English in the writing fluency. Lexical chunks, as the composites of form, meaning and function, stored and retrieved as a whole in brain, can release the language processing burden and improve…

One of the many challenges facing Japanese university students studying English is the multi-word phrase. The English language contains a large number of such multiple-word items, which act as single words with a single meaning. This study is concerned with evaluating the efficacy of yes/no checklist tests to assess knowledge of multi-word units.…